BusinessPaws Spotlight: Lead With Fun

Lead With Fun is a training company based in Fairfax County, North Virginia. With a focus on positive reinforcement training techniques Jennifer Pennington and her team work to improve the lives of dogs and make it easier for families in their community to work through common training challenges. Their team of canine behaviour professionals work with clients struggling with leash reactivity due to poor socialization, lack of basic manners-based skills, frustration, fear, and more. Families learn not only why their dogs are behaving the way they do but also how they can teach their dogs to be more calm and comfortable in everyday situations using positive reinforcement behaviour modification techniques. Their rolling enrollment puppy classes aim to help prevent these reactivity challenges from the start. By allowing puppies to join classes before their formative socialization period is over and keeping play groups small, they are able to expose puppies to a variety of socialization opportunities without causing them to become overwhelmed.

Owner and head trainer at Lead With Fun for more than 12 years, Jennifer Pennington is a Certified Professional Dog Trainer (CPDT), is a Certified Dog Behavior Consultant (CDBC) through the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC), has a dog training certification from Animal Behavior College, and is Fear-Free Certified. She regularly speaks on topics such as dog bite safety, dog training, and low-stress handling throughout her home state of Virginia.

After earning her BS in Biology, Jennifer Pennington started her career as a reptile zookeeper, working with rattlesnakes at the American Rattlesnake Museum in New Mexico. She later worked as a keeper at Busch Gardens, then at Reptiles Alive!, performing educational shows with live reptiles. As a long time dog lover, Jennifer also regularly attended training classes with her own dogs during her free time. These classes focused on positive reinforcement training techniques that were very similar to those she used when working with animals at her day job. She was consistently impressed with the effectiveness of those training methods, even when working with dogs struggling with reactivity. With her extensive training experience, from trick training with her family’s dogs as a child to working with wild animals as a zookeeper, she decided to start training with a few of her own students on a casual basis. 

While working as a Search and Rescue K9 Handler working with her canine partners to find lost people in the wilderness, Jennifer came to recognize the incredible difference dogs can make in peoples’ lives. Following this realization, she made the decision to change her career and take up a new job at a dog daycare. She focused on learning more about canine body language and techniques for working with larger groups of dogs, while continuing to read more about dog training and behaviour and attended as many conferences and classes as possible. As demand for her training services grew beyond what was possible to manage part-time, Jennifer made the decision to leave her dog daycare position and open her own business, Lead With Fun, pursuing dog training and behaviour full-time. 

Over 12 years in business, Lead With Fun has lead by example with their positive reinforcement and behaviour-driven training techniques. Having grown to a team of two trainers, they now offer both individual and group training with a variety of service options including puppy training, behavioural training, and specialty classes such as scent detection, tricks, and agility. Jennifer is proud of their long running success as a training business, and is impressed by the number of other training companies shifting their focus to science-backed methodologies, supported by extensive experience and degrees in animal behaviour. She’s excited to see an increase in opportunities for trainers to access continued education programs and expand their skills, particularly in animal behaviour.

Through her many years of training Jennifer has developed her skill in building connections with people. Though she is introverted by nature, she loves to watch people and their dogs learn, and adores helping people raise their dogs to meet their potential. Her passion for the science of learning has led her to the realization that the same solution cannot be applied to every challenge, and that not every family has the same goals in mind for their pet’s manners skills. Everyone wants a safe, happy life with their dog, but that can look different for each individual. By focusing on a family’s unique needs and objectives, they can transform behaviour and allow families to move forward happily with their dogs.

One example of such a behaviour transformation was Jackson, a dog whose family could not walk him down the street if there were any dogs in sight. After trying traditional training methods Jackson’s behaviour seemed to only escalate. When his family reached out to Lead With Fun they implemented positive reinforcement training techniques, which resulted in incredible changes in his behaviour and overall demeanour. Jackson went from barking at every dog he saw and being unable to focus at the beginning of their training journey to walking happily past multiple other dogs in his final session.

Another dog that made a significant impact on the Lead With Fun team was Dixie, a young Cavashon. When she first came to work with Jennifer Dixie was regularly going on multiple daily 3-mile walks with her guardian, Ellen. Ellen was struggling with Dixie’s behaviour, stating that she was unable to calm down at home, and would constantly get herself into trouble. After chatting with the trainer, they determined that Dixie was over-exercised, lacking sleep and mental stimulation. Jennifer and the Lead With Fun team worked with Ellen and Dixie to help adjust their routine to better meet their needs. They worked on developing more training skills, incorporating fun trick training exercises. They also added both regular naps and enrichment exercise into Dixie’s daily life. These changes not only helped Dixie and Ellen to live more harmoniously, but also turned Ellen into a true training enthusiast! They have since become a regular customer for Lead With Fun, frequently returning for a variety of different training classes.

As their services have grown in popularity, Jennifer and her team have also worked through a variety of challenges. When the COVID-19 pandemic caused widespread shutdowns Lead With Fun found themselves needing to pivot their business model. Fortunately a previous shift to include online learning options for their clients allowed them to adapt to the new landscape quickly. They moved the bulk of their classes online and implemented a new, self-paced online course for customers looking for training help while stuck at home. As the world opened back up, Lead With Fun continued to make use of these resources, offering their online courses to clients outside of their usual business area and sharing them as supplemental homework material for clients taking in-person classes with their team. 

Another challenge faced by Lead With Fun is the low number of certified behaviour consultants. Their team regularly books up months in advance, with any new spots filling extremely quickly. Though they are glad to have demand for their services, they have struggled to find trainers with the necessary qualifications to add to their team. They hope to be able to bring on another behaviourist, but are determined to find someone that is the right fit for them and meets their education and experience requirements.

Moving forward, Jennifer foresees that the training world will continue to shift towards services provided by licensed professionals with higher degrees of education and experience. Though the field has already changed significantly, even in just the last 10 years, she expects customers will continue to expect more from their trainers as their knowledge of animal behaviour grows. As access to training resources increases, the standard for training and behavioural expertise will increase as well. 

With so much experience in the dog training industry, the Lead With Fun team has seen many trends come and go. They recommend that any business in the pet care field stay curious and remain open to learning, no matter how much experience you have. Take classes in subjects you are not familiar with, and learn how the best teachers teach something new. Remain open to the idea that there is always room to grow, and remember that if you make a mistake you can learn from it and get back on track. They also recommend keeping in mind that, through all the new technological advances and social media trends, people are still people. Families want their animals to be safe and happy, but they are also human. They will at times get scared, frustrated, tired, joyful, silly. By focusing on what people really need and listening to what they have to say, you can help to find the solution that best meets their needs and that of their pets.

To learn more about Lead With Fun, including a list of their team’s many certifications and their available services, check out their website. They can also be found on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

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Lead With Fun is a valued client of BusyPaws, making use of our booking, CRM, communications, and payments systems. We’re pleased to share a small part of their story with the pet care community.